The Value of Life
by Charity Angel
Summary: In which Ianto comes face to face with a small part of Jack's reality. Mentions of canon character suicide.


Ianto was pissed off with him, that much was clear. Jack even, unusually, had some idea of just what had upset his young lover. Yesterday, just two days before Christmas, Jack had willingly gotten into a carbon monoxide-filled car and died multiple times over so that John Ellis would not die alone. Ianto had been the one to locate them and turn the engine off, the one to pull Jack from the car and into the fresh air. For the first time, and probably not the last, Ianto had seen him draw that first, painful gasp of air, had watched as the red hue vanished from his skin, had cradled Jack as his mind muddled through the confusion that generally accompanied his resurrections. Ianto had unquestioningly folded an unprotesting Jack into the SUV, loaded John's body by himself, and driven them back to the Hub. He had taken Jack's coat away from him and pointed him towards the showers, and re-forged John's records to remove the traces they had created so that he would have been able to make a life for himself here and now.

Throughout the day, Jack had got the distinct impression that it wasn't the first-hand experience of immortality that Ianto was upset about. Ever since the day Ianto had told Jack that he had known for nearly a year, they had engaged in several frank discussions about the subject. He thought Ianto had processed the idea thoroughly enough that he would have been able to face a resurrection. And there was no-one he could talk to – Gwen, the only other person who knew about his immortality, would ask too many questions that Jack couldn't answer about his relationship with Ianto, and Tosh, the only other person who knew about his relationship with Ianto, would ask too many questions he didn't want to answer about his immortality. So he did the most mature thing he could think of: he sulked, he moped, he brooded.

In hindsight (thoughtfully provided by Tosh), the most mature thing would actually have been to discuss it with Ianto. But he and Ianto didn't really do the whole talking about their feelings thing; their relationship wasn't like that. Tosh had rolled her eyes at that – not as spectacularly as Ianto would have done, but enough to convey her contempt.

It was with the threat of the Wrath of Tosh descending upon the Hub that Jack actively stopped hiding and went and sought Ianto out. He was hiding in the Archives, filing like an obsessive-compulsive demon. That was when Jack realised just how upset Ianto was: the OCD was just a cute quirk until Ianto was upset, and then it consumed him.

"Did you want something?" he snapped when Jack lurked untidily.

Jack took the opportunity to approach Ianto, although the hug he was hoping for was stopped in its tracks by a single look.

"I can't apologise if I don't know what I've done to upset you."

Ianto's expression morphed from anguished frustration to incredulity. "That's… that's true, I suppose." He ran a hand through his hair nervously, and straightened his tie. To waste a little more time, he licked his lips to moisten them.

"At first, I thought you just needed space to get over the shock of seeing me dead," Jack said to fill the awkward silence. "But it's not that, is it?"

Ianto shook his head. "It isn't really something you've done wrong," he admitted. "I know exactly why you did what you did, but you can't ask me to like it. I know you see your life differently, because you're not mortal, and I thought I understood that. I even knew that you'd killed yourself before." Ianto's eyes were brimming with tears as he met Jack's gaze. "But I don't think I will ever be able to understand _why_ you would treat your death so casually, why you put yourself through the pain of coming back, just because you know it's going to happen. What if it doesn't? You don't know that this is permanent – what if next time is the one that sticks?"

Jack shrugged. He couldn't answer that, because Ianto wouldn't like what he said and, for some bizarre reason, Jack realised that it mattered to him what Ianto thought. But the truth of the matter was that Jack had died in pretty much every conceivable way by now, multiple occasions of which were by his own hand, and he had given up trying to make it stick. But if the next one was the _one_, then he welcomed it.

"You might not value your life," Ianto continued, his voice starting to tremble as he struggled to hold on to his emotions, "but I do. I understand that you will always throw yourself in front of a bullet for one of us, because that's who you are, but I will _not_ pick up the pieces after you've committed suicide again. I can't…"

Jack crossed the remaining couple of feet between them and kissed Ianto, pulling him close and moulding their bodies together, holding Ianto as everything got the better of him. Ianto wasn't an overtly emotional man: Jack had only seen him cry over the woman he loved. He dealt with death and destruction every day without batting an eyelid. Right now, he was crying and clinging to Jack as if he was afraid to let him go again. And perhaps he was: Ianto had dealt with the idea of Jack's immortality well on an intellectual level, but the reality was somewhat different. Jack couldn't say he had dealt with it well at first either, but at least he had a pretty good idea that it was permanent. Ianto was still processing.

"You won't have to," Jack said softly. "That was the first time in a long time, and…"

"You didn't…" Ianto gulped back a sob. "You didn't want John to be alone." He drew a shuddering breath. "I understand that. I just…"

"I know, and you'll never have to do that again," Jack whispered, holding Ianto tightly to him, not wanting to let him go ever again, not wanting to cause him this anguish ever again. He would stay alive as much as possible, die as little as possible, to keep Ianto from this pain ever again. "I'm sorry."


End file.
